Technical Abstract:
The objective of our study was to develop a nutrition education toolkit for communities in the Lower Mississippi Delta (LMD) with content that is current, evidence-based, culturally relevant, and user friendly. The Mississippi Communities for Fealthy Living (MCHL), an evidenced-based nutrition education intervention, was conducted with women's social and civic organizations in the LMD and were the foundation for the toolkit. Organizations will receive the toolkit and training for further outreach in their respective communities. Qualitative methods were used to explore participants' perceptions of key resources needed for effective nutrition education in this target population. Key informant interviews (N=13) were conducted with experts in health promotion as well as participants who were designated as "champions", i.e., group leaders, in each organization from the MCHL intervention. Interviews were recorded and transcribed. Data were analyzed using a question-by-question coding technique. Codes were developed into common themes according to the patterns in the data. Health promotion experts perceived simple, hands-on experiences, games, cooking demonstrations, and visual aids as most useful in educating adults about nutrition. As potential community educators, champions wanted a toolkit that provided flexibility to tailor to their needs. They expressed the importance of including topics related to exercise, health snacks, potluck dinners, beverage consumption, and meal planning to help their communities. Equiping communities with an evidence-based resource can ultimately improve nutrition education efforts and influence positive behavior changes. Further development and dissemination to ensure cultural appropriateness of the toolkit is needed before using it with other populations.